CEDP 201 NAME:
Life Span Development
Instructor: Jackson
How We Study Children: Observation and Experimentation
Please fill in the blanks as you watch the video. This assignment is worth 10 points.
1) Many of the studies generated by debates on preschool education have been based on
observational methods.
2) Kathy Sylva used the observational method to categorize play among preschool children
into two types, ordinary and complex.
3) Sylva’s team of researchers noticed that the pattern of play changed based on whether
children were playing alone or with others.
4) With so much going on in the preschool environment, the challenge is how to reduce
observations to manageable proportions without losing the crucial details.
5) The use of descriptors to capture common classes of behavior across many subjects is
called coding the data.
6) Some of the behaviors are ambiguous, and this is all part of the challenge.
7) One way to improve the reliability of data is to have two or more researchers code the
data at the same time.
8) Researchers aim for 80–90% percent agreement between observers.
9) Another problem is that the presence of researchers might alter the children’s behavior.
10) Sylva found correlations between type of play and whether children were playing alone
or with others.
11) When the children played alone, Sylva found that ordinary play happens 74% of the time
and complex play happens 26% of the time.
12) Peter Bryant said that observations alone won’t tell you what is causing changes in
children’s behavior.
13) Both kinds of information produced by observational and experimental research are
essential.
How We Study Children: Observation and Experimentation (continued)
Life Span Development
Instructor: Jackson
How We Study Children: Observation and Experimentation
Please fill in the blanks as you watch the video. This assignment is worth 10 points.
1) Many of the studies generated by debates on preschool education have been based on
observational methods.
2) Kathy Sylva used the observational method to categorize play among preschool children
into two types, ordinary and complex.
3) Sylva’s team of researchers noticed that the pattern of play changed based on whether
children were playing alone or with others.
4) With so much going on in the preschool environment, the challenge is how to reduce
observations to manageable proportions without losing the crucial details.
5) The use of descriptors to capture common classes of behavior across many subjects is
called coding the data.
6) Some of the behaviors are ambiguous, and this is all part of the challenge.
7) One way to improve the reliability of data is to have two or more researchers code the
data at the same time.
8) Researchers aim for 80–90% percent agreement between observers.
9) Another problem is that the presence of researchers might alter the children’s behavior.
10) Sylva found correlations between type of play and whether children were playing alone
or with others.
11) When the children played alone, Sylva found that ordinary play happens 74% of the time
and complex play happens 26% of the time.
12) Peter Bryant said that observations alone won’t tell you what is causing changes in
children’s behavior.
13) Both kinds of information produced by observational and experimental research are
essential.
How We Study Children: Observation and Experimentation (continued)
